The Four Books

'Lenin's Kisses is a sprawling tome that rakes over China's historical and contemporary social and political landscape. It has a satirical, allegorical bent that skewers pomposity and the cult of personality.' Sun-Herald/Sunday Age 'Author Yan's deft satire, comic touches and his endless compassion bring smiles and tears through a journey that swings effortlessly back and forward between the absurd, the real and moments of magic. It is an epic tale of how grand, event if well-meant, plans can be tarnished by greed and unhappiness. It cautions against being consumed by power. Here is a splendid storyteller in the tradition of Jonathan Swift. Yan's writing is masterful, his imagination and his satire soars above the common.' Courier Mail 'Lenin's Kisses is a triumph, a blistering absurdist allegory and a genuine contest to the idea that writers working in China are rendered mute, like many of the residents of Yan's fictional village, by the political structure around them.' Saturday Age 'Yan Lianke sees and describes his characters with great tenderness...this talented and sensitive writer exposes the absurdity of our time.' La Croix 'Yan Lianke weaves a passionate satire of today's China, a marvellous circus where the one-eyed-man is king...Brutal. And wickedly funny.' L'Express 'Yan's postmodern cartoon of the Communist dream caving to run-amok capitalism is fiendishly clever, in parodying the conventions of fables and historical scholarship. The ghost of another famous dead Russian, Nikolai Gogol, hovers over the proceedings in spirit, if not in economy of means.' New York Times 'Set Rabelais down in the mountains of, say, Xinjiang, mix in some Gunter Grass, Thomas Pynchon and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and you're in the approximate territory of Lianke's latest exercise in epatering the powers that be...A satirical masterpiece.' Kirkus Reviews 'Both a blistering satire and a bruising saga, this epic novel examines the grinding forces of communism and capitalism, and the volatile zone where the two intersect...A heartbreaking story of greed, corruption, and the dangers of utopia.' Publishers Weekly 'Lenin's Kisses is an absurdist historical allegory of the money-making fever that swept China after Deng Xiaoping opened up the Chinese economy in the 1990s. [Lianke] has advised writers to confront censorship with art, not politics [and] this innovative novel, with its wit, humanity and satire, sets a provocative example.' Guardian 'Yan at the peak of his absurdist powers. He writes in the spirit of the dissident writer Vladimir Voinovich, who observed that reality and satire are the same .' New Yorker 'Whimsical and horrifying by turns... a no-holds-barred satirical allegory of recent Chinese history.' Listener, NZ 'This epic tragicomedy deftly satirises the exploitation of the Chinese people by greedy, power-hungry and inept officials. Yan Lianke showcases many talents of his own, including brilliant absurdist humour and self-censorship.' North and South, NZ 'For once, the hype doesn't go far enough...a devastating, brilliant slice of history.' Times 'Scathingly effective satire.' Thousands 'Woven together, these texts reflect the catastrophe of the times and meditate on the meaning of integrity, truth, love and ethics when confronted with horror...[Lianke] has produced an extraordinary novel.' Guardian 'Satire edged with Swiftian moral disgust...[Lianke's] fiction of ideas feels hard won and genuine, an expression of sorrow, bafflement, anger, and love.' Rumpus 'The Four Books is a remarkable novel which brings to life an event which I knew about only in the abstract. ANZ LitLovers 'A compelling account of the absurdities of the tragedy that killed an estimated 30 million people.' North and South